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Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Mumia still on death row, but executions of journalists on the wane

Outcome already
decided in trial of Swedish journalists?

Mumia still on
death row, but executions of journalists on the wane

On
the eve of the 9th World Day Against the Death Penalty, Reporters
Without Borders and the Paris-based NGO Together Against the Death Penalty
(ECPM) pointed out that being a journalist, editing a website or keeping a blog
can still expose a person to the possibility of the death penalty in some
countries.

The
charges of “subversion,” “endangering state security” and even “apostasy” can
be used in some countries to convict and execute someone who has criticized the
government, made fun of a leader in a cartoon or just covered a highly
sensitive subject.

Around
10 people, mostly bloggers and netizens, are awaiting execution or are facing
the possibility of a death sentence in Iran and Vietnam. What will become of
Vahid Asghari, 25, who has been jailed since 2008 in Tehran and who was
sentenced to death on a date that was never made public?

As
well as a negation of justice, capital punishment is also a deadly threat that
encourages self-censorship. China, which leads the world in executions, has no
fewer than 55 capital offences of which three are direct threats to freedom of
expression: “endangering public security,” “instigating the country’s division”
and “divulging state secrets.”

In
Uganda, the imprisoned journalists Augustine Okello and Patrick Otim are still
waiting to know whether the charges of subversion and treason that have been
brought against them will cost them their lives. Abdelrahman Adam, a Sudanese
radio journalist who has been held since October 2010 on a charge of violating
state secrets, is in the same situation.

Nonetheless,
the number of journalists being sentenced to death is declining. Even in Iran,
which ranks second in the world in the number of executions, death sentences
are being commuted or quashed. Capital punishment neither deters crimes nor
compensates for the damage caused. Still less can it destroy the inalienable
right to inform, question and speak out.

Of
the few journalists actually under sentence of death, the one who has been in
the situation longest has become a symbol of the campaign for abolition. He is
not an Iranian, Vietnamese or Sudanese. He is a citizen of the United States.
Sentenced to die for the murder of a policeman at the end of a trial marked by
irregularities and racism, Mumia Abu-Jamal will soon complete his 30th
year on death row.

Would
he have suffered the same fate if he had not been what he called the “Voice of
the Voiceless,” a voice that still makes itself heard from his cell (http://mumiabujamal.com/ site/index.php)?
Would he still today be the victim of judicial persecution by a Pennsylvania
district attorney, who is trying to block a new sentencing hearing?

Thirty
years on death row is a long time. But 30 years since France abolished the
death penalty and scrapped the guillotine is not. The coincidence reinforces
the symbolism. All the more reason to insist that, after Troy Davis’ execution,
Mumia Abu-Jamal is not subjected to judicial murder too, RSF and ECPM said on
October 10, 2011.

Outcome already
decided in trial of Swedish journalists?

Reporters
Without Borders will pay close attention to the trial of Swedish journalists
Martin Schibbye and Johan Persson, which has begun on October 18, in Addis
Ababa. Arrested on 1 July after illegally entering the south Eastern Ogaden
region from Somalia, they are charged with terrorist activities and violating
Ethiopia’s immigration laws.

The
terrorism charges are completely unfounded as Schibbye and Persson were just
doing their jobs as journalists, the press freedom organization said on
Wednesday.

“Prime
Minister Meles Zenawi’s claim in a recent interview for the Norwegian newspaper
Aftenposten that they were acting as the ‘messengers of a terrorist
organization’ does not bode well,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Has the
outcome of the trial already been decided by the government? Asks the press
freedom organization. RSF would like to urge the Ethiopian government to
reconsider its expansive application of the anti-terrorism law to try local and
foreign journalists. We also urge the Swedish authorities to give this case the
importance it deserves and the European Union should also take an interest and
use its relationship with Ethiopia to help find an acceptable outcome.”

Schibbye,
a reporter, and Persson, a photographer, were arrested upon entering the Ogaden
region with members of the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), an armed
separatist group branded a terrorist organization by the Ethiopian government,
with the aim of covering human rights abuses in the region for the Kontinent
news agency.

Immediately
after their arrest, Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt criticized them for
entering an area for which his ministry had issued a travel warning. The
ministry’s subsequent silence on the subject of their arrest has been heavily
criticized by national and international news media and journalists’
organizations.

Schibbye
and Persson were not accompanied by a lawyer when they were formally charged on
6 September. If convicted, they could face the possibility of life
imprisonment, RSF lamented.

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